Before visiting a new city, I’m always curious to see what kind of tattoo artists and styles are there beforehand.

My profession as an online marketer, allows me to search the web more efficient than the average tattoo-enthusiast, yet, I’m still having a hard time finding a good tattoo artist as a tourist in a new city – which is why I’m writing this guide – to speed up the process for you.

The primary tools and websites I use to find tattoo artists are Google, Instagram, Reddit, Yelp and Foursquare.

Not only do you need to find a talented tattoo artist, you also want to find:

Before we go into the methods I use, I would like to clarify that there is no perfect solution. Finding a great tattooer is a time-consuming task, but hey, you are going to wear the tattoo for the rest of your life…

Searching Reddit’s Tattoo community with Google

Reddit has an incredible tattoo community of people posting their new tattoos and sharing the artist’s name and where they tattoo.

How: Click here and replace ‘New york’ with the city you are visiting. Browse the first page of Google and see if there’s anything you like.

Finding tattoo artists using Google

The no-brainer method

Doing a search for Tattoo + city often gives you a pretty decent overview of the most popular tattoo parlors in the city. And I’m not saying Google will show you the best, ranked by quality, but it will give you a lot of choices and your job is to visit their website, Facebook and Instagram account to see their latest work.

Foursquare

Foursquare is similar to Yelp and Trip Advisor and the same goes for Foursquare; it won’t show you the best tattoo studios in town, but it will give you a decent overview of the most popular shops and it’s your job to browse through their Facebook Page and Instagram profiles.

On a final note, I would like to state that I usually spend 5-10 hours browsing 20-40 different tattoo artists, before I pick where to make my appointment – but to me, the end-results is easily worth it.